Silver Screen

Hey everybody. Sorry for the infrequency of updates. It's the same old excuse: I've been busy at work, and it has been bleeding into my free time. Sunday, especially, was a bloodbath. R and I did manage to get our den/office painted on Saturday, however (R did the more time-consuming edge work, and then I swooped in to do the rolling). Silver Screen (swatch provided above) was our chosen color. It's possible we chose it entirely for its name. It sounded like an inspirational color to be surrounded by while editing movies. Then again, we used the same color for the interior of our garage a few months ago, so maybe there is no correlation.

What else can I tell you? I guess there's a lot in the works around here. We have some trips planned, some visitors coming soon, and some new videos being completed. I'd rather wait until after these events occur before filling you in on the details. It should be a busy spring, so stay tuned.

Paddy's Day

Cool picture taken by R, eh? My ultra talented wife accompanied me on a trip to Dewey Beach over the weekend and assisted me with the latest Bud Light Film Crew video shoot. We covered the St. Patrick's Day celebration at the Starboard Restaurant & Bar. A guy from Bud Light set us up for the night with a room at a house a few blocks away from the bar. Free beer and no need to drive home was an ideal situation for us to let loose after the shoot, but it didn't happen. We gave up drinking for Lent, you see. It has been a difficult sacrifice. I think next year I'll give up chocolate instead. So R and I kept it professional and watched the hosts of the video get toasted instead, which actually happened before the shoot. I'll be doing my best to remove their slurred speech from the interviews during the editing process. The video should be all right. Picture it: the usual horde of rowdy youngish people yelling into the camera... only this time... they're wearing green.

Taxing and relaxing

I worked on the dreaded taxes over the weekend (with R's help, of course), and things were going all right until I got to the state of Delaware, primarily because the tax software I'm using doesn't handle a part-year residence in this state. So I printed the forms, attempted to fill them out by hand, and got about half way through before declaring incompetence. What it comes down to is the question of what is the most advantageous way for us to file: as joint residents, joint non-residents, single residents, or single non-residents. The instructions say we can take our pick, but the only way to find out the best option is to fill out the forms each way and compare. This whole process is complicated by the fact that I live in Delaware but work in Pennsylvania and that R worked for the same company the whole year but in two different states. Despite having a job in the financial business world, I really never developed much comfort with handling money. Accounting is not my strong subject. I will be able to file our federal, Alabama, and Pennsylvania returns using the software, but as for Delaware, I think I might take it into H&R Block.

On Friday night we watched Babel, which was decent, yet a little tiring. It fit in well with the director's prior films, Amores Perros and 21 Grams, and I say that because by the time I was done watching all them, I was exhausted and down and didn't really feel like discussing them. All three are well made and well acted, yet they do not contain something that I like about movies: the joy. I also finally completed Seven Samurai over the weekend, which was a solo project for me since R made the choice to not get involved from the beginning. It was an admirable movie but also draining due to it's sheer length, clocking in at 208 minutes. Still, I have been wanting to see it for a while and am glad I finally did. I like watching older movies because you are able to see the wheels working. They are not as seamless as today's slick, yet often soulless productions. Sometimes I like to witness the very basic principles of filmmaking in use, especially when the sum ends up being more than its parts. It gives me hope for my own filmmaking aspirations.

The premiere of Jack of Clubs is quickly approaching. We will be attending the April 12th screening at Theater N. The hype is building. Follow this link for the latest article on the film found in Out & About. And if you haven't yet checked out the collection of photos in my gallery that were taken by a talented photographer named Evan Krape over the course of four days on the movie's set, take a look here.

The music post

The following is paraphrased dialogue between me and my wife during Saturday night's Guster concert in Philly:

"Dude, Guster's getting old."
"Dudette, we're getting old."

Even in the over-21 partition of the venue we felt out of our age group. I thought Guster was a band from our college days. How do kids today know the lyrics to all of their songs? Apparently the band is still popular and still putting on good shows. We definitely enjoyed this one. They didn't play a bad song in the set. As an added bonus, Mason Jennings opened for them. He seems to be aging as well and perhaps mellowing out some. He lacked a fire that he had in the earlier days of his career, but that could also be because we was only the opening act. I will say that his performance was more polished than the last time we saw him. Plus, mellow is not necessarily a bad thing.

Speaking of music, the new Arcade Fire and Air albums come out tomorrow. I've had them pre-ordered because regardless of any negative reviews they may receive, I'm still going to want them. These are two cases where the bands' previous work is strong enough for me to blind buy anything new from them. And I want a hard copy. I'm fine with downloading some albums, but Arcade Fire and Air are on my A-list (funny how they both happen to begin with the letter A), and I haven't completely left the CD format behind yet. I still prefer that "old fashioned" sound sometimes. As R joked, one day we'll be saying that to our kids, and they'll be laughing at us – ha ha, look at crazy old Dad with his scratched up Smashing Pumpkins discs.

In case you're looking for recommendations, here's what else I've been listening to and liking lately:

Post-War by M. Ward - My sister-in-law introduced to this guy a few years ago, and I am very grateful. Check out Transfiguration of Vincent for his finest hour.

9 by Damien Rice - Heartbreakingly good.

Wincing the Night Away by The Shins - For when I need something light and poppy.

Reckoning by R.E.M. - A terrific companion-piece to my favorite R.E.M. album, Murmur.

Bone Machine by Tom Waits - I've been trying out a few of Waits' albums recently, and this is the one that stuck. I love the imagery.

XM Radio - I've been doing talk radio in the mornings, but usually surf the music stations on the way home. Some of the play lists are so vast I'll hear a song and then never hear it again, which can be good and bad.

Bud Light Film Crew #3

The first thing you'll notice is that we have new hosts this month. It is a film crew after all, so there may be some shifting in the personnel involved from month to month. Our original hosts, Traci and Jeff, couldn't make it to the shoot because of an impending ice storm, but they will likely be back again in the future. Everyone seems to like their replacements, however, so we might mix and match them a bit. So far I'm still in charge of shooting and editing, but as the CityLife schedule gets more hectic I may have to occasionally give up my role as well.

This is our longest video yet, and I had the shortest amount of time to edit it, so take that for what it's worth. I could probably spend the rest of my life making adjustments, so maybe it's good I had a tight deadline.

I hope you have a good set of speakers attached to your computer because if you can't hear Queen's baseline, there's no point to watching it. Here you go:

http://www.budlightfilmcrew.com/